First

Smart Ticketing for Franchise Bid

The Challenge

We assisted a national Transport Group in preparing a bid for a Train Operating Companies (TOC’s) franchise, that required smartcards to be used throughout the franchise.
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Our client was one of four TOC’s that were invited to tender for the South West of England franchise. As part of the full service solution our client included e-ticketing for travel and for parking, smartcards were the chosen token as the e-ticketing delivery mechanism.

Our Approach

Consultancy
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Consulting Smart was engaged to design the Card Scheme and Card Management System and assist in the Functional and Applications Specifications. We worked along side the Senior Management Team at the primary contractor and the senior representatives of the Bid Team at the Transport Group.
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A full regional survey was conducted to identify which applications were appropriate in which locations. Analysis was conducted to identify the possibility of allowing an ITSO (Integrated Transport Smartcard Organisation), and Oyster capability on a single chip.
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All local authority smartcard schemes in the franchise area were analysed for collaboration potential. Finally, the scheme structure was documented agreed by all partners and included in the main bid document.

The Result

The client found our expertise exceptionally useful and confirmed that our input had added significant value to the bid, which was successful.

Smartran has used Consulting Smart Ltd as resource on a number of multi-application smart card scheme assignments in both the public and private sectors.

We have always found their experience and knowledge of the complex subject of multi-application schemes invaluable on our projects and our clients echo this view. In particular, Steve Beecroft whose knowledge base covers other emerging technologies including Near Field Communications has become a key member of our Team and regularly works on scheme projects and peer reviews.

We have no hesitation in recommending Consulting Smart Ltd for the development and implementation of a multi-application multi-vendor smart card scheme.